Missouri's rural teachers are among the lowest paid in the country; lack of state tax revenue is partially to blame

 Missouri's rural teachers are 'second-worst paid' in the
U.S. (Photo by Tristen Rouse, St. Louis Public Radio)

American teacher salaries have not kept pace with other college graduate professions, and for rural areas, the wage disparities continue to grow. In Missouri, a new report on rural education found that the "state's rural teachers are paid better only than those in Arkansas," reports Kate Grumke of St. Louis Public Radio. "Missouri also has one of the lowest rates of state tax revenue, meaning the burden for funding schools falls heavily on local taxpayers."

The study "collected salary expenses in rural school districts across the country and divided those by the number of teachers in the district to calculate teacher pay, "Grumke explains. "They found Missouri's rural school districts spend less on each teacher than every state except Arkansas. The researchers used a cost-of-living adjustment to more accurately compare compensation."

Nationally, Missouri falls lower on teacher pay, but "this report highlights the acute issues in rural parts of the state," Grumke writes. "Low salaries in rural districts often lead to high turnover, as teachers move to nearby suburban districts that often pay significantly more, said Phil Murray, president of the Missouri National Education Association and a former teacher."

Like many rural schools searching for low-cost teacher retention fixes, some Missouri schools have implemented a 4-day school week. Jon Turner, an associate professor at Missouri State University who studies rural schools, told Grumpke: "We've now passed the 30% mark of the number of schools that are on the four-day school week, and almost all of them are rural schools. One of the primary factors of that is because rural schools struggle to hire and retain high-quality teachers."

Grumpke reports,"Missouri also had one of the lowest rates of state tax revenue compared to local revenue; the state contributes about 75 cents for every dollar of local funding. This heavy reliance on local property taxes creates significant challenges in rural school districts and other districts where property values are low.

"Missouri is really an outlier here in that we put all the burden of operating rural schools on the local taxpayer," Turner told Grumpke. "And sometimes the teachers and the kids pay the price because there's not as much tax revenue coming in at the end of the year to support those rural schools."